THE MOST SORROWFUL MAN IN THE WORLD

I was born on Columbus Day, 1954 and as a child was more than willing to accept the conventional hero stories of that era. Later, when my friends and I were old enough to  read objectively and think for ourselves, many of us became appalled, as are countless others, by the real story of Columbus: the  destruction of native people and their cultures, the cruelty, greed, arrogance.  The writings of European men who came to the New World primarily to plunder it are notoriously unreliable, but now and then you can find a passage that shimmers almost against the writer’s will with astonishment at the natural abundance of North America. To anyone with the capacity to appreciate it, the experience must have been mind-blowing. Although most of the pages of Christopher Columbus’s journals are dry and practical and self-serving, when he wrote about seeing Cuba for the first time, he burst into  poetry.  But notice how quickly the language turns cold as he converts his marvels into commodities:

“…And flocks of parrots that obscure the sun; and there are birds of so many kinds and sizes, and so different from ours, that it is a marvel. And also there are trees of a thousand kinds and all with their own kinds of fruits and all smell so that it is a marvel. I am the most sorrowful man in the world, not being acquainted with them. I am quite certain that all are things of value, and I am bringing samples of them and likewise of the plants.”  

4 thoughts on “THE MOST SORROWFUL MAN IN THE WORLD

  1. joe heywood

    Amen. I’ve always wondered what it felt like to be a people discovered, like Martians descending on Munising and discoverding the earth’s people, or something.

    Reply
    1. Jerry Dennis Post author

      In every case that I can think of throughout history, being “discovered” is the immediate precursor to being conquered. Not good to wake up in the morning and find immense alien vessels anchored offshore…

      Reply
  2. Jeff Van Valer

    11/01/2012 03:27
    Agreed here. Who did the painting of the parrots? The strawberries remind me of a Radiolab podcast about a strange parallel between a biologist-turned-visual-artist Maurice Ravel, and his piece, Bolero.

    Reply



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